


A Very Cathedral Christmas

by papenniesandbentoboxes (Doughnut_Holschtein)



Category: Nancy Drew (Video Games)
Genre: Action/Adventure, BROTP BABES, Christmas, Christmas Presents, Gen, I need more of them, i just love these two
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:27:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27857561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Doughnut_Holschtein/pseuds/papenniesandbentoboxes
Summary: Alec and Zoe work together to stop Revenant and celebrate Christmas together in the process.
Relationships: Alec Fell & Zoe Wolfe
Comments: 2
Kudos: 2





	A Very Cathedral Christmas

Seattle wasn’t where Alec thought he’d be spending Christmas. Ever since he and Zoe saved his sister, Grace, he thought he’d be spending Christmas with her and her husband. But his new job had other plans for him.

He and Zoe had been called in to investigate and run surveillance on a possible cell of Revenant. They spent days casually following them and Zoe tapped into the security cameras in the area. After a few days, they realized they were planning to set off a bomb containing a disease, not unlike the Colony one, in one of the public malls. Since they had no official backup nearby, they decided to do what they were warned not to do unless absolutely necessary, and they took matters into their own hands.

It wasn’t the first time Alec had been shot at and he knew it wasn’t going to be the last. The same situation would also work for the fact that he was just hit with one of the bullets. After the gunshots stopped, he heard shouting and the sound of a truck engine starting up.

“Alec!” Called Zoe from afar. She waved him over.

Grunting, he stood up and jogged over to her, putting a hand on his arm to maybe stop the bleeding a little. The men with the bomb, which was concealed in a briefcase, had disappeared. 

They were in the parking garage below the mall. A few of the cars here now had bullet holes in them, so he was hoping these people had good insurance. 

“Aye?” He asked, panting.

She pointed behind him. “They went out the east exit.”

Cursing, he ran with her to their sanctioned SUV. When they reached the car, he jumped in and reached for the steering wheel, but remembered at the last second that they weren’t in Scotland anymore and the US was very different in terms of road laws.

“Sorry, buddy,” said Zoe, buckling up and very quickly turning around. “Gotta remember these things.”

“Shit.”

As they drove, Alec was reminded of how reckless Zoe’s driving could be. After they got onto the open street, she took a hard left, sending Alec into the door of the car. He grunted as his arm hit the window. It was still bleeding, but he couldn’t feel the pain. Too much adrenaline. He was going to feel it later, though. He knew that much.

Zoe picked up speed as they got onto a wider street. The street lights lit up the street in the dark, and the snow reflected light everywhere. Of course, this had to be the only time it snowed in Seattle. 

“Aim for their tires,” she said as they neared the enemy car.

Alec took his pistol and leaned slightly out the window. It was hard to aim with the car at such a high speed and with the snow. He got the fender and the back window, but the snow made it impossible to get a clear shot.

In the driver’s seat, Zoe had made a call-- using their specially designed communications system in the car-- to the American agency she had worked with before.

“This is Zoe Wolfe, codename Samantha Quick, requesting backup on Westlake and 8th, heading north.”

“Wait, who is this?”

She groaned. “Just get me on the line with your highest superior and tell them what I told you, and do it fast.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Alec ducked back into the car to avoid a bullet in his head. He was trying to slow his breathing. That was probably the closest call he’d had in a while.

“This is Director Brown. Is this Samantha Quick?”

“Yes, sir.”

“We’re sending backup in your direction. Are you still on Westlake?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll have my people on their way. Is this supposed to be covert? Out of the eye of the public?”

“It is.”

Well, they sure did an awful job with that aspect of the job.

Zoe abruptly stepped on the brakes and the only thing keeping Alec from flying out the dash was him grasping the seatbelt a moment before it was too late.

“Shit!” She shouted, slamming her palm on the steering wheel.

The Revenant operatives had sped through the intersection and had caused a collision. Three cars were jammed against each other, and there was no room for them to get through. 

Zoe took a deep breath after Director Brown said, “Try to lay low. Drive away, and when possible, change the license plates. I’ve got my people on it.”

“Thank you, Brown.”

He hung up and Zoe instantly backed up from the intersection and began driving away as though nothing happened. 

After driving away from the collision and the operatives, they switched the license plates and then arrived at their hotel, which happened to be a more fancy one than usual. 

Before the mall bombing situation had happened, they were instructed to go undercover at an elite gala and try to stop a bombing there. They had succeeded. Not with catching the suspect, but with stopping the bomb. Luckily, because of the whole “elite gala” cover, they’d been given a room in a five-star hotel. Alec was sure glad. He didn’t like sleeping in the car or a dingy motel. 

Besides, they had a glass water cooler with fruit in it in the lobby. Alec loved that stuff.

They entered the lobby as nonchalantly as possible, Alec wearing a thick winter coat to try and cover up the fact that he had been shot. As Zoe checked in again, asking for another room key since theirs had been lost in the tunnels of Seattle-- which surprised Alec that there  _ were  _ underground tunnels in Seattle-- Alec made sure to get a large plastic cup of lemon and blueberry water. After getting grazed with a bullet, he deserved that water, goddammit.

Christmas music was playing in the elevator as they went up to their room. As soon as Zoe pressed the button for the doors to close, she asked, “Is your arm okay?”

He shook his head. “Nope. The adrenaline is wearing off and I’m not happy about it.”

“Damn.” She took off her snow hat and hand her fingers through her hair.

“Luckily, it’s not the first time I’ve been shot,” he said, raising his eyebrows and tilting his head towards her.

Zoe gave him a smirk as the elevator doors opened. “And it won’t be the last. Not in our line of work, anyway.”

When they got back into the hotel room, Alec quickly tossed his coat on his bed before rushing to the bathroom to clean out the wound.

After taking off his leather jacket and shirt, it took him a while to get his wound cleaned out before Zoe walked in with a bottle of rubbing alcohol. She held it up and got out some cotton balls.

“It’s not the worst,” she said as she sterilized it. “I mean… I’ve certainly had  _ way _ more terrible bullet wounds than this.”

He winced through his teeth. “Yeah, me too. Doesn’t make them any less painful.”

After she finished, he reached to help her wrap it but she slapped his hand.

“Stop moving, dumbass, or you’ll bleed more and we’ll have to clean up even more blood and I  _ know _ you hate that.”

Well, he couldn’t disagree with her there.

“I’m a bit sad about that jacket. It was a nice one.”

“Yeah, well, it’s got blood and a bullet hole now, I think you’ll have to get a new one.”

It took longer than anticipated to get it fully taken care of-- bullet wounds were not to be taken lightly-- and when they were done and she had handed him a bunch of pain pills, Alec put on an old t-shirt and fell face-first onto his bed.

“I’m exhausted, Zo.”

She was in the kitchenette, stirring something in a mug. “A shoot-out and a car chase will do that to you.”

He groaned into his pillow.

“Hey, cheer up.” She nudged him. Turning to look up at her, he saw her holding out a mug to him. “Have some hot cocoa. We might have gotten shot at today, but it is still Christmas Eve.”

Taking the mug of cocoa, he smiled. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

She turned on the TV and made a quick switch from whatever the news was saying to the Hallmark Channel. After wrapping a blanket around her shoulders and hopping onto her bed, she sat there, as content as possible, watching the title screen of the movie  _ Once Upon a Christmas Letter _ . 

Smirking, Alec turned to her and said, “Never thought you’d be the type to watch cheesy Christmas movies.”

“Please,” she said before taking a sip of her cocoa. “I can’t stand cheesy movies  _ unless _ they’re Christmas movies. I typically like my action thrillers and science fiction, but… I don’t know. For some reason, even though they’re completely predictable and have bland characters, these movies are comforting this time of year.”

He smiled and watched it with her. “Grace likes these too. Her husband can’t stand them, though. But he watches them with her anyway, since they make her happy. And, you know, they’ve grown on me. I can’t wait to see Emma stay in the small town to marry the local baker.”

That made Zoe smile a little. It was nice when he could force a smile out of her. She was pretty snarky and cold, so it was nice getting to see the warm part of her.

“You know if you want, and if we’re not running for our lives next year, I bet Grace and James would love another guest other than the three of us.”

“You’re inviting me over for Christmas?” She asked, furrowing her brow.

“Aye, might as well,” he said, shrugging. “I mean, we’re pretty much family now, and you have no choice but to be stuck with me until we get reassigned or killed.”

Zoe gave out a sigh. “Good point. And you know what? I think it would be nice to spend Christmas with someone other than myself for a change.”

“Hey, you have me this year.”

“Yeah, but we just got away from a situation that could have gotten us killed, so it’s not ideal.”

He took a drink of cocoa. “Point taken.”

The movie was over in about seventy-five minutes, and Alec was very tired. Normally after an assignment, he’d spend some time getting in a few push-ups or a jog to keep himself in shape, but today, since it was Christmas and he had gotten shot, he decided he deserved a break and another few cups of hot cocoa. By the time the movie had ended, he was on his third cup.

“Hey, heads up,” said Zoe as she tossed a wrapped up present towards him. It hit his eye and he cursed under his breath. 

He hadn’t expected her to actually get him a present. Smiling to himself, he untied the cheap plastic ribbon around it and unwrapped the newspaper around it. Zoe had gotten him a nice pair of Seattle themed socks with fish and coffee cups on them.

He laughed at the gift. Not because it was stupid, but because he was thankful for it. He hadn’t had a good laugh in a while. He missed those laughs. Besides, he needed new socks. All the running he’d had to do had worn holes in his.

In return, he handed her a little present with a very poorly tied bow. She eagerly opened it, and just stared at it for a while. She held up the pair of earrings and put on the matching ring with her mouth open.

“Are these the new models they were talking about at headquarters?” She asked, staring him down.

He nodded. “Aye. I thought you might like them.”

“Are you kidding?” She leaped off the bed and looked at herself in the mirror. “Do you know how deadly these will make me?” She laughed as she looked at herself in the mirror, with her garnet earrings and ring. 

She took one out and then grabbed one of Alec’s earpieces from the kitchenette, programing it to the same frequency. After handing it back to Alec, she said, “Okay, I just want to test these out. Just… I don’t know, talk to me or something and I’ll hear it in the bathroom.”

He watched as she dashed inside the bathroom and shut the door. Putting in the earpiece, he said, “Can you hear me?”

Her ecstatic response was heard clearly. “Yes! I can!”

Zoe walked out of the bathroom, looking closely at her new ring.

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to try this thing out on you.” 

“Good.”

The ring was the thing she was most excited about. While the earrings were disguised earpieces, the ring was a disguised taser. When she first found out about it, she went on for hours about how cool it would be to get one.

“Damn,” she commented, looking at his new pair of socks. “I did not anticipate your gift being… This. I kind of feel like I owe you and I don’t like that.”

“Zoe,” he said, giving her a smile. “It’s a gift. Besides, if I hadn’t gotten you them, they would have been assigned to you in, like, a month.”

“Still…” Collapsing on her bed, she said, “I never really had super celebratory Christmases in my childhood. That habit went with me into my adult years. I’m just really bad at Christmas.”

“Nah, you’re fine. I’ve had… Weird childhood Christmases.”

“Really?” She was intrigued. Sitting up and crossing her legs underneath her, she asked, “Could you tell me about them?”

“Why? I never took you for a story-loving sort.”

“Stories are nice. Besides, they often have nice little inklings of blackmail information in them.”

“Blackmail information?”

“Hey, someone might want to know embarrassing information about you and I could tell them, ‘You know, Alec believed in Santa Claus till he was sixteen’ and that would probably work.”

He shook his head. “Well, my childhood Christmases were fun and we would host the family Christmas celebration every three years, trading off with our cousins. One time, we invited my childhood best friend, Grant, and he was the first-footer, and--”

“First-footer?” Zoe interrupted. “Remind me what that is again.”

“First guest. They’re supposed to bring a small gift for good luck. Anyway, instead of bringing a typical loaf of homemade bread or his mother’s black buns, he had made four pounds of shortbread for the party.”

“He thought four pounds of shortbread was a  _ small _ gift?”

“Well…” Alec shrugged. “Grant and I played rugby in secondary school, and he ate more than anyone else on the team, so I had assumed at the time that it was because to him, four pounds wouldn’t be a ton of shortbread. But after the party, he said he’d made that much because he thought there was a rugby team party, so he thought he’d make it for all of us. When he realized he had actually mistaken that date for the New Year’s one, he decided to set a record for the most shortbread from a first-footer or something.”

“And did he?”

“I have no idea, but he did end up eating most of the shortbread.”

Through the night, Zoe listened intently as Alec told her about the Fell family Christmas hijinks, including a time he threw a snowball into his neighbor’s upstairs window and blamed it on their son. After a while, Alec noticed the pain meds starting to wear off, so he took some more, and then told Zoe, “We should probably get to sleep soon. Our contact probably wants to know what happened and we should be awake early enough to tell him.”

She flopped back onto her pillow and sighed. “Guess so. And before I forget,” she said, turning to face him, “you owe me for the hot cocoa. That was out of my personal stash that I hoarded from the lobby.”

“Well, I’ll be happy to pay for Christmas dinner tomorrow, provided it’s not at a super fancy restaurant. Our job doesn’t pay as well as it should.”

“Amen to that.” 

Turning off his lamp and laying down under his blankets, he heard Zoe say, “Merry Christmas, dumbass.”

“Merry Christmas.”

“Damn, I hope we don’t get shot at next year.”

“Aye, you and me both.”

**Author's Note:**

> Merry Christmas, readers! I honestly can't wait till that happy day. I wrote this fic because I LOVE Alec and Zoe, and I think they'd be a hilarious pair if we got more of them together. I might write more fics of them, but for now, I have just this one. Thank you for reading!


End file.
